Reversing one of its long standing policies on the Xbox platform, Microsoft has confirmed that they will be supporting some manner of self-published games on the forthcoming Xbox One console, and revealed that every retail console will be able to function as a developer kit.

Previously developers of games on the original Xbox, and Xbox 360 would not only have to purchase expensive specialised developer kit consoles from Microsoft in order to create games, but would also have to sign up with an approved third party publishing partner, or Microsoft themselves in order to sell their titles on the system.

In a statement sent to several international publications, Microsoft's Chief Production Officer for Xbox, Marc Whitten had the following to say:

"Our vision is that every person can be a creator. That every Xbox One can be used for development. That every game and experience can take advantage of all of the features of Xbox One and Xbox LIVE," said Xbox chief product officer Marc Whitten. "This means self-publishing. This means Kinect, the cloud, achievements. This means great discoverability on Xbox LIVE. We'll have more details on the program and the timeline at gamescom in August."

The announcement appears to have been made somewhat prematurely following leaked developer on the self-publishing initiative, and the lack of clarity is already causing speculation that it might not be the open season on Xbox One development that some may have presumed on first read.

Comments from several prominent indie devs by way of tech blog Engadget remain particularly hesitant, with Retro City Rampage Brian Provinciano expecting something more restricted than pure Xbox One development:

Make no mistake; while this is a great thing, it's again not the equivalent to what other platforms offer. On PS4, for example, developers can tap right into the system; use every bit of RAM and all of its power. Indies have access to everything that the AAA studios do, from platform support to development and release. The indication on Xbox One is that it's essentially XBLIG 2.0. Instead of XNA, it's Windows 8. Windows 8, which is already struggling to gain developer interest, will gain a boost from developers wishing to target the console. However, it won't be as full-fledged as published games on the system.

Reading between the lines (and this is pure conjecture on our part), our best guess is that self-published games are likely to be fenced within the Windows 8 kernal environment on the console, rather than being able to "code to the metal" like games on the Xbox OS proper.

Whitten's comments regarding security in this Game Informer article also suggest that the 'every console as a dev-kit' ability will be heavily controlled by Microsoft --perhaps using the always-online paradigm they had originally intended for all Xbox One users before the infamous about-face:

"This is the type of thing that you can only do at the start of a generation," Whitten explained. "You make a set of assumptions, and those assumptions get baked in at the beginning. When you ask questions like that [about security], you're looking through the lens of how Xbox 360 works, and based on how we developed a lot of these things in 2004 and 2005."

Whitten also reportedly confirmed to Game Informer that this functionality will not be available at launch, so chalk up another big announcement from Microsoft marred by ambiguity and suspected hidden detractions.

The GamesCom 2013 expo will be taking place in Cologne, Germany from August 21st, where Microsoft is expected to host another major press briefing, so we suspect they had intended to make this reveal there in full, before today's leaks compelled them to respond prematurely. With all that Xbox PR has already gone through this year, you kind of have to feel sorry for them.